


Bring Her Home

by halfeatenmoon



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Canon Era, F/F, Éponine Lives
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-03
Updated: 2018-07-03
Packaged: 2019-06-04 21:35:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,515
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15156101
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/halfeatenmoon/pseuds/halfeatenmoon
Summary: Cosette could always see a different future for them. Éponine could not.





	Bring Her Home

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Anthusiasm (HalfwayDecentFanfiction)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/HalfwayDecentFanfiction/gifts).



When they were children, Éponine still stole away to play with Cosette whenever she could. It didn't matter that her mother disapproved, that she spoiled Éponine and left Cosette to dress in rags, or that she beat them both whenever she found them together. Éponine had been taken with Cosette the moment they first met, playing in the dirt with both their mothers there. She didn't understand how it was okay then, but it became forbidden as soon as Cosette came to live with them. Her new playmate coming to live with them should have been a cause for joy; instead, it meant confusing double standards and rules she couldn't understand.

The part that didn't change was Cosette. She was irresistable; she was the best playmate Éponine had ever had. Cosette dreamed, the most fantastic dreams, and when they played together, she brought Eponiene to dream with her. They played in castles and magical forests and secret tunnels, worlds away from the Thenadiers' filthy inn. Cosette imagined the two of them as angels, or princesses, or sometimes as simple shopkeepers selling dolls in the marketplace. Any kind of life they wanted, anything but the life they really lived. Cosette could imagine the two of them anywhere. Éponine had never been able to imagine herself anywhere but exactly where she was.

 

 

Éponine barely thought of Cosette any more. She was hungry, starving every day in the hot summer sun, though she starved just as badly when she froze in the winter snow. All she thought of was surviving to the next day, to get enough food and to get out of her father's next scheme alive. Crime and hunger were her whole existence now. She didn't spare a though for what had happened to Cosette, and she didn't have time to dream.

The only thing she dared to dream of was Marius; to spend a little more time in his eyes. He didn't see the devil in her. He was wrong, of course; she was a criminal and a wretch. But if he noticed her downtrodden state, his eyes didn't linger. When he spoke to her, it was as if he were speaking to someone else, someone who could be good. Éponine didn't believe that, hadn't believed it in a long time, but when she was with Marius, she could imagine that there was some good in her, somewhere.

Until she saw Cosette on the street on the day of the brawl, and she saw what goodness really looked like. Cosette looked like an angel in her beautiful clothes, her hair shining, handing out food to the poor. Éponine felt as if her heart stopped for a moment as she saw Cosette coming down the street towards her - struck by her beauty, first, and then by recognition, and finally the consciousness of her own filthy hair and ragged clothes. She tried to side-step, to slink away before Cosette could reach her and offer Éponine the bread from her basket. Éponine had begged and stolen to feed herself for the last ten years, but this, a gesture of kindness from _Cosette_ , was too much to bear.

She was quick enough to avoid Cosette's offering hand, but not to avoid meeting her eyes. For a split second, Cosette was gazing back at her, and Éponine felt her skin prickle all over with the realisation that Cosette recognised her, too. Then she stepped aside, trying to slink away. Leaving Cosette's gaze to fall on Marius, instead.

 

 

Marius could love Cosette, sure. It was fine. Fine. Éponine could bear this, she really could. Marius was a good person, and Cosette was the essence of goodness itself. Cosette ha dared to dream that one day her life would be better, and now it was, and they deserved each other. Éponine's arrest record and petty scheming and blackmail had no place here.  
Yet even as she led Marius to the place where Cosette lived, she was fuming. She lurked in the shadows by the gate and watched them filled with envy in too many ways. She wanted to be Cosette. She wanted to be in Marius' place, to touch Cosette, to see if some of her goodness could rub off on her, too. To ask, _do you remember? Was it worth it? How did you escape and become so good when you grew up in the same hell as me? Is there hope?_

She couldn't say why she screamed to send off her father's men, exactly. For Marius? For Cosette? All she knew was that as much as she envied them, she couldn't stand to see either of them hurt. Eponine was nothing. If she could take the brunt of her father's violence instead of Cosette, perhaps her life could be worth something, at least.

 

 

Death didn't come for her that night, in the end. She merely chased her father away. But her time, she was sure, was soon to be up. She couldn't outrun it. And she knew they were already building the barricades.

 

 

Cosette didn't belong at the barricade. She knew that much. Ever since her papa had taken her from the Thenadiers, he'd impressed on her the importance of staying safe. But she woke the morning after the rebellion with her papa gone, a letter on his desk from Marius saying that he had gone, and no sign that was anyone left for her in all the world. She picked up her shabbiest clothes, and took to the street.

She found the barricade a stinking, conquered mess. Blood between the cobblestones, broken furniture everywhere you looked, and the women of the town everywhere, picking through the rubble. Some of them were searching to find anyone there who was left to save. Most were just cleaning up the mess. One of them watched her with weary eyes as Cosette picked through the mess herself, looking for some sign that one of her loves had survived, and said "Don't get your hopes up, child. There's nothing but death for you here."  
She was wrong. Cosette didn't find what she was looking for there, but she did find Éponine.

The girl was barely breathing. Her body had been dragged aside, into one of the houses the students had occupied, her body laid as gently as she could. Her left shoulder was crusted with blood, her clothes soaked; no wonder they must have thought she was dead. But at Cosette's trembling touch, she opened her eyes. Slowly, yet shocked. As if she couldn't believe that she lived.

"Hello." Her voice sounded like dust.

"Hello," Cosette replied. Her voice was clear, but she found she had tears in her eyes.

"Am I dead?"

"No, I think not."

"I was supposed to die." Éponine sounded truly disappointed.

"I'm glad you lived. Come on, I'll take you home."

"I don't think so. I don't think I can move. And there is no home for me."

"Nonsense. Your home was mine once. My home can be yours."

Éponine laughed, a hoarse, choking sound. "The place where we were children hardly deserves to be called home."

Cosette regarded her for a long moment. It was true; that place had held nothing but suffering from Cosette. It had never been a home.

She stroked Éponine's hair, pulled it out of her face. "I thought it was a kinder home to you than it was to me. But that wasn't true at all, was it?"

"You found a better place. You deserve it," Éponine said, closing her eyes.

"And you don't?"

Éponine didn't answer. Whether she was unconscious or simply giving up on answering, Cosette couldn't tell. All she knew was that despite all the hurt between them as children, the parts she remembered now were the kindness - Éponine saving her from thieves a few nights ago, and Éponine joining her in her daydreams. Cosette could have hated her, but when she looked at Éponine among the dirt and the rubble, all she felt was love. And the determination to bring her home.

 

 

When Cosette lifted Éponine's slight, tired body in her arms, it was so exquisite that Éponine could have cried. She was aching in some places, and in others she was in so much pain she'd gone numb, but she forgot it all as Cosette carried her through the street.

_I don't deserve this,_ Éponine thought, even as she clung to Cosette, her soft, warm skin and the gentle fabric that soothed her and the safety of Cosette's arms, holding her up. _I don't deserve this._

But she was hungry, as hungry as she'd ever been. Her stomach was quiet, but even when her belly was full she had always had other hungers, ones that had never been sated. Nothing could stop her from wanting to be loved; not her father's hate, not Marius' indifference, not even the nearness to death. She was hungry, and Cosette was kind, and beautiful, Éponine didn't count herself strong enough to turn away. If Cosette was going to offer her love, Éponine couldn't resist taking it, whether she deserved it or not.


End file.
